He tries to make her get more from grandfather, but she will not write begging letters, and she won't give him what she is saving for me." It was a simple and sordid enough explanation in one sense, and it was one of which Bettina had known, not one parallel, but several.

Having married to ensure himself power over unquestioned resources, the man had felt himself disgustingly taken in, and avenged himself accordingly.

In him had been born the makings of a domestic tyrant who, even had he been favoured by fortune, would have wreaked his humours upon the defenceless things made his property by ties of blood and marriage, and who, being unfavoured, would do worse.

Betty could see what the years had held for Rosy, and how her weakness and timidity had been considered as positive assets.

A woman who will cry when she is bullied, may be counted upon to submit after she has cried.